Do you know the history of your Ancestral town?

There are more than 8,000 towns in Italy, almost double the number of hamlets but they all have one thing in common: each one has a unique name with a history behind it. 

We recently came across a town called: CIVITELLA MESSER RAIMONDO (located in the province of Chieti in Abruzzo).  Interesting name we thought and wanted to learn more about it.  Known only as Civitella (or Civitellam) at least from the 1100s, the town was an estate (or feud) owned by several different families, Orsini, De Aviano, D’Aquino and finally Baglioni. It was in 1650 that the King of Naples knighted Giacomo D’Aquino with the title DUKE OF CIVITELLA MESSER RAIMONDO, after (Messer as in “sir”) Raimondo Da Anichino who had previously owned Civitella. 

The picture is a postcard portraying the south side of the town printed in 1935. Courtesy of Pietrino Di Sebastiano.